Welcome
to the Coleman Institute's website. The Institute was founded
in 2001 by a generous gift to the University of Colorado System
from William
and Claudia Coleman. Our mission is to catalyze
and integrate advances in science, engineering, and technology
to promote the quality of life and independent living of people
with cognitive disabilities. The Institute is actively engaged
in supporting research, development, dissemination, and education
in cognitive disabilities on the four campuses of The University
of Colorado System in Boulder, Colorado Springs, and Denver. We
are committed to providing scientific, technological, and public
policy leadership to strengthen the voice of persons with cognitive
disabilities and their families in our society.
When we refer to "cognitive disabilities" on this website
we are primarily referring to mental retardation and developmental
disabilities, acquired brain injury, Alzheimer's disease, and
severe and persistent mental illness. These conditions affect
over 20 million American citizens -- seven percent of the U.S.
population. Prevalence rates for cognitive disability will grow
rapidly as our nation ages and as advances in the medical and
rehabilitative sciences extend the longevity of persons with disabilities.
Cognitive disability stems from a substantial limitation in one's
capacity to think, including conceptualizing, planning and sequencing
thoughts and actions, remembering, and interpreting the meaning
of social and emotional cues, and of numbers and symbols. Common
consequences of cognitive disability include stigma and discrimination,
social isolation, difficulty communicating, poverty, and institutionalization.
Moreover, as societies become more technology reliant, a rapidly
growing "digital divide" is developing between persons
who are competent to use emerging technologies and those with
cognitive limitations who are not competent to do so without adaptive
personalized modifications and training.
The University of Colorado is a formidable research enterprise.
We currently rank among the top nine public and private universities
in the United States in federal research expenditures. By investing
the Institute's research resources in project support and matching
funds for CU faculty, we seek to help them leverage additional
cognitive disability research grants from external funding agencies
such as the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation,
the U.S. Department of Education, and the National Institute on
Disability Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR). In October 2004, at
the annual Coleman Conference on Cognitive Technologies, NIDRR
director Steven Tingus announced that CU had received a $4.25
million grant from NIDRR to establish the first Rehabilitation
Engineering Research Center (RERC) on Cognitive Technologies.
The Coleman Institute is providing an additional $1.25 million
of support for this ground-breaking center.
In
addition to the RERC, the Coleman Institute is presently supporting
a number of exciting research projects led by investigators on
CU's four campuses. Several of these projects involve the application
of new computing technologies to cognitive disability. Under development
are animated learning tools, Personal Digital Assistant (PDA)-based
voice training programs, smart housing and transportation systems,
and recreation technology specifically designed for health promotion
for people with cognitive disabilities. Other initiatives focus
on neuroscience research. Learn more about these projects on this
website, and about scores of additional research projects in cognitive
disabilities in cognitive disabilities being carried out on CU's
four main campuses.
The
Coleman Institute provides direct funding for projects such as
those described above, but we also assist CU faculty by providing
challenge grant funding for Coleman Graduate Research Assistantships
in federal research grant applications. We have numerous such
commitments to CU faculty at the present time.
Every
year we support several major conferences on cognitive disability
research. For the last four years, our own annual “Coleman
Conference” has been a national event, bringing together
faculty researchers from across the University of Colorado System,
disability leaders, federal agency heads, and prominent scientists
and engineers. This conference is explicitly designed to explore
research frontiers and partnerships in cognitive disability and
technology. This year’s event, “Enhancing the Quality
of Life for People with Disabilities through Technology,”
was held at the Hilton Denver Tech Center on October 4th and 5th.
Speakers included Vinton Cerf, senior vice president of Technology
Strategy, MCI, and co-designer of the protocols and architecture
of the internet; Mary Wooley, president and CEO, Research! America;
Eric Dishman, director, Intel Proactive Health Research and National
Chair, Center for Aging Services Technology; and many other outstanding
scientists, researchers, and advocates. See
this link for the complete conference agenda and presentations.
This website not only provides information about the research
and related activities we support at CU. We also provide links
to a nationwide array of cognitive disability and technology resources
in universities, state agencies, parent and professional associations,
private corporations, and the federal government. We invite you
to visit our site, to use it to link to other resources in cognitive
disability and technology, and to return frequently.